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Advocacy:Public support for or recommendation of a particular cause or policy. From the Latin advocare “summon, call to one’s aid.”

While working to get college students registered to vote, one young man, while walking away, turned halfway around and said, “Voting? Nobody does that anymore.”

Another young woman offered this, “Politicians will do what they want. Why vote?”

I worry that these sentiments will be the demise of democracy and lead us to an authoritarian type of government. I was lucky that I grew up in a family that took voting seriously and talked politics constantly – we were a divided house with my mother’s side strongly Democratic and my father’s strongly Republican. There were many late-night discussions, sometimes heated, but everyone was still speaking to each other the next day. I learned that voting was a privilege, a right and a responsibility.